“My child’s behavior is not normal,” is a line I hear often. Let me ask you, dear reader, what is the definition of normal? Ok that’s too philosophical, so let’s ask an easier question. Who decides if the behavior is normal or not? You — the parent? You’ll tell me “No, everyone says it’s a problem, it’s not just me,” or that you brought him to a professional who gave his stamp of approval to saying that your kid has a problem. Who wrote the rule book on “normal?” Who can?

How about we apply the same questions to feelings. “My child is too angry or too sad.” “He’s too nervous for a boy.” “How strongly is a feeling supposed to be felt? Because I think my kid’s really overdoing it.”

I’m sorry — I won’t give a direct answer to any of these questions. What I will tell you, though, is that our children learn how to accept themselves and their feelings from us. Whether or not we think a child’s feelings are acceptable or not pretty much directly translates into whether or not our children accept themselves. Dr. John Gotman wrote a book called Raising Emotionally Intelligent Children. It’s a fantastic book, because in it he tests the parents on how good they are at accepting feelings. Then he goes on to explain how that affects the children. Like I’ve explained previously, the more we run away from a feeling, the bigger it gets. For example, if we run away from sadness, it turns into anger. If we run away from anger, it turn into rage, rage turns into depression, and depression into psychosis. If we were to accept the sadness, express it, and let it go, it could technically be over in thirty seconds to a minute and a half. Many of us shlep that minute and a half for ten to thirty years.

Let’s say a child is feeling anger and her parents are really not ok with it. The child learns to interpret the world and their place in the world by looking at mirrors that we call parents. When I say “parents,” I mean mothers. Sorry ladies, but that’s just how it is. Fathers can be a delicious dessert, but the meat and potatoes of a child’s introduction to the world is Mommy. So now this child is angry, and Mommy is not ok with it. The child will start to feel that something is wrong with her — and whether something is or isn’t, she will have problems later on. Because if you tell a child something is wrong with them, eventually they will believe you and act like there is. For most of us, we don’t just come out and say “Hey kid, something is wrong with you.” It could be something as subtle as a look or a sigh. If the child is extremely bright, then you’re in trouble, because you could say or do nothing — just feel it — and the child knows what you’re feeling. Like Chazal say, “kemayim panim lepanim….” It takes a lot of koach to deal with kids. Let’s say we have a sugar addicted mom who goes through the typical highs and lows of sugar consumption. She will have little to no patience to deal with her child. So mom will run to cookies or cake to give her that boost to get her through bed time. But she just made the problem worse for next time. Now her body is even more stressed, because it has to process this unhealthy food on top of her emotional distress. And there is only a certain amount of time until she crashes.

In my experience, this crash is usually after birth. Woman are notorious for not taking care of themselves emotional and physically. Probably because they need it the most, the Yetzer Hora makes it harder for them than for other people. So they go about their martyr business — not taking care of their emotions or their nutrition — and then when they undergo the stress of child birth, the body’s defense mechanisms collapse and they experience what we call post partem depression. In my experience, post partem depression doesn’t exist in a lady who can express her feelings. And it’s very hard to express anything when your hormones are constantly depleted from sugar withdrawal.

Now people have been writing to me a lot about specific diets and how much sugar they should have. I don’t prescribe a one size fits all general diet. If you’re interested in a class to discuss these issues on a personal level and in greater depth, please email me and I’ll see when I can arrange one.

I will point you in a general direction though. Try to stay away from processed food as much as possible. When you think of the people who own food companies or soda companies, what kind of image comes to mind? A big heavy set male who eats all day, right? Try a skinny guy in a white lab coat with glasses. All the top CEO’s of food companies are Ivy League grads with chemistry degrees, like Howard Moskowitz. Mr. Moskowitz developed a principle called the bliss point, which is the maximum sweetness that people like without it being too sweet! This is what made Dr. Pepper a top seller.

And if all that sugar would look bad on the label, then they put in less sugar but more fat, since fat stimulates the same pleasure point in the brain as sugar. Point is, the food people are smarter then we will ever be — just stay away from their Frankenfood as much as possible.

The truth is that sugar is the modern day cigarette. Sugar is linked to the two top causes of death: heart disease and Type 2 diabetes. Too much sugar is the most pressing health issue we have today. The more we understand this, the safer we and our children will be